


A Plague on Both Your Houses

by sublimeWaves



Series: 25 EXO Challenges [3]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dance, Body Rolls, Improper Use of Dance Terminology, M/M, alter ego
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-20
Updated: 2016-05-20
Packaged: 2018-06-09 13:41:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6909706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sublimeWaves/pseuds/sublimeWaves
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jongin and Baekhyun dance around each other, literally.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Plague on Both Your Houses

**Author's Note:**

> Emotion: Focused  
> Word: Point  
> Theme: Change vs Tradition

He performed outside the studio, the warm-up room to be exact.

It was less of a performance than a protest.

It was well known that the school was the best in the nation for putting out the most elite ballet dancers and it was a great source of pride for them.  They ranked high in all sorts of types of dance (top five for all that they offered) but ballet was the most valued among them all.  It was why Jongin had chosen to study there, why he went through the rigorous audition process to get selected.

That meant that when the warm-up studio, one of the exclusive ballet rooms, was flooded due to a prank gone wrong three weeks ago the ballet class merely changed rooms but a ‘street dance’ class (Jongin could honestly not tell you which one) was moved from midday to late night.  The backlash was the numerous students outside protesting with loud music and dance outside the studio during class time and an even deeper resentment at the ballet department from the rest of the school (as if they weren’t hated before).  It fell on deaf ears where the school was concerned but not on the instructors and the students.

On the first day, the music blared during the first few minutes of their class and their teacher was livid.  The students were not to break composure and the wall towards the front of the studio was purely windows so that the students could watch the protesters and vice versa.  Jongin had all but ignored the protesters outside, even when they whooped and hollered.

Victoria, head of the class and a senior, had talked to the teacher about the noise.  It really was not fair that the street dancers had to move their time (and to such an unreasonable time at night), but the ballet school’s end of the of the year performance was coming up, a huge event for the alumni and surrounding upper class community, and they could not afford to not practice like they needed.  The revenue raised by the performance went towards the department and school was no small amount and that alone was enough to need to not be distracted by the protesters.  The environment was certainly not conductive to a ballet setting as it was continuously filled with rap music.

Jongin did not want to deal with this.  He was a second year and had just landed a huge roll in this year’s end of the year performance of Romeo and Juliet as Mercutio.  It was an honor for him to be so young and get the part.  He knew he was considered one of the best in the school and needed to work extra hard to not let anyone down.  Scouters from the national ballet and other ballets from other nations may attend which mean huge opportunities for his career.  This left no room for distractions.

And yet…

A blonde stick of a male performed outside his studio, always in front of the third window from the right with moves that enchanted him.  From his spot on the bar as he warmed-up he had the perfect view of the back of the man.  He knew the warm-up routine by heart (first position, second position, third position, fourth position, fifth position, carriage the arms, down to the ground, back up, raise the foot… never-ending formations) leaving him time to observe the man.  The man seemed to be older than him but stuck with a case of ‘baby face’ or ‘puppy face’ in this case.

The moves were not the most clean and sharp, but were sometimes liquid.  Movements melted with the lows of the music and rose with the highs.  The grace and elegance was different than he had seen anyone do a street style.  The man was not about technique but about _feeling_ the music.

He was not the only protest dancer, nor the best dancer of the group, which was a bit embarrassing to say the least for Jongin to make up that he was observing all of them and not just one.  There seemed to be five dancers, including the blonde man that made up the core leaders of the student movement.  One of the best was a brown haired dancer that always hid his hair under a beanie.  Thin, fluid or rigid, he was exceptional, even in his freestyling.  He seemed to be comfortable doing choreography as well.

There also were two older blonde girls, one the main leader and seemed to make every move absolutely effortless while the other was stockier and seemed to have fun with her style.  The last was a curly haired boy who seemed to be in the process of learning, not at the same level of the others.  Jongin would watch him as he executed move after move wrong but there had been a little progress even in the short time Jongin had watched him.

“Do you miss it?”  He hears the whisper of his best friend on the other side of the bar as they raise their right foot to the back, calls of the teacher telling them to remember to straighten their legs in the background.

Taemin, his best friend, had been with him since he was small, both the only boys in dance class leading to a gravitation towards the other.  He was also a great dancer, being chosen to play Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet.  When the decision had been made they had laughed, anticipating the dance in which Tybalt killed Mercutio.  He knew Jongin better than anyone else, even himself sometimes, and immediately had caught Jongin’s unwavering interest in the protest dancer.

Jongin considered the question.  At their previous school, the two best friends had been the leads (Taemin was captain and himself was second in command) of the dance team which was primarily engaged in freestyle and break dancing.  During the night they were rigid with ballet steps and during the day they were more laid back as they breakdanced.  The contrast was a bit jarring when they started but they had adjusted by the end.  They had won some competitions but nothing major had happened to keep them in that style of dance.

The two had dreamed of being ballet dancers since they were small.  It was both of their passions.  When they had been accepted into this ballet program, they had little time to continue with any other style of dance.

Jongin would like the protesters to go away so that he could fully immerse himself in his music and dance.  That was the good thing about them only using this room for warm-up and another for actual practice.  When Jongin danced, _something_ changed within in.  He _becomes_ the music that he is trying to portray.  It was such an intense change when he was smaller, that Taemin and him had come to naming the almost alter ego ‘Kai’.  This is why most of the dance department called him Kai as a nickname.

Jongin was a shy kid who watched things from the sidelines was overall a boring dork.  Kai was focused, sensual, and breathtaking.  Jongin could feel confidence rush over him when he danced, proud of his abilities and hours upon hours of hard work.

“Sometimes.”  Jongin could hear his best friend sigh.

“Me too.”

\---

A few days later as Jongin walked up to the studio with Taemin when he saw some of the protesters in a heated argument with Victoria was recently cast as Juliet in their upcoming production.  So much for ignoring the protester strategy.

Jongin sighed when he realized which dancer she was primarily butting heads with.

“You took our class time!”  The blonde boy he usually stares at said.

“That is not our fault.”  Victoria’s voice was steady, arms crossed.  Jongin walked up beside her with Taemin at his side.  Having five against one didn’t seem fair even if Victoria looked like she was holding her won.

“You can’t just take it!”

Taemin spoke up trying to diffuse the situation.  “What’s going on?”

“ _They_ ,” Victoria pointed to the group of protesters, annoyed, “want to have a dance-off judged by other students in the department.”

“For the room?”

“Yeah, it’s ours!”  Curly haired boy calls from the back of the five member pack.

“Shouldn’t you take this matter up with the school?”  Jongin says quietly.

“Like they will listen to us.”  The blonde, front and center, points to himself and then does a sweeping gesture to the rest of his group.  “Not with you golden children gallivanting around!”

“Why would we participate?”  Taemin asks.  “We have nothing to gain.”

“We need to get them to stop or they’re threatening to protest the stage production debut.”  Victoria hissed out.  The two best friends looked at each other seeing if they heard right.

“What?”  Jongin asked.

“People pay actual money to see us.”  There is anger in Taemin’s voice, slowly rising.  “This isn’t just some student event.”

“Like we care about your little stage production.”  The curly one says.

“ _Little_?”  Victoria repeats slowly before bursting.  “We make more money for only one of our _little_ stage productions then your section probably makes in a year!”

The blonde protester seems to have none of his feathers ruffled as he maintains eye contact with her.  “Oh well.”

Victoria grips her hand and the best friends pull her away from them before she says something stupid as they group and whisper.

“We’ll have to.”  Taemin says. “We’ve worked too hard to have anything go wrong with this show and we can win.”

Victoria, usually rational, would normally not take the challenge but right now she was furious and she turns around.  “We accept.”

The blonde dancer smirks.  “You’re on.”

The protesters stayed with their horrendous noise throughout the warm-up period class after the confrontation.  Jongin couldn’t say that “Bubble Butt” by Major Lazer and the master piece of “Winter” by Vivaldi really went together. 

Jongin was secretly fuming, who were these brutes to ruin their production?  The ballet company was informed and a few dancers had come forth to say that they wanted to participate.  In order to beat them, Victoria suggested that they study the dancers to see if they were really that good or not.

Victoria was outright glaring between the blonde boy and the brown curly boy, an emphasis on the later.  Jongin saw a small glint in Taemin’s eyes as well as Eunhyuk and Jimin as they surveyed the dancers outside the window.

While he tried to stay focused on the beanie boy who specialized in pop and lock and was gorgeous to look out, his eye kept being drawn back to the loudmouth blonde boy.  This transitions were awkward, rigid in places and flowing in others, but no less unappealing.  It was his _style_ and it was hard to look away.

It was the end of rehearsals during the end of a particular arduous warm-up technique that was usually passed that the boy turned and locked eyes with Jongin.  The stare struck through Jongin’s brain and ruptured all through his body so all he could do was stare.  It made the other smile and wink before returning to look away from his position waiting for the next song to star.

The next song had the blonde stop his regular moves as a slower R&B song came on.  Leaning back, the boy slowly rolled his body to the beat.  The move was sensual and at least one of the other protesters whistled in amusement.

Jongin was transfixed.

\---

The next incident was a few days later.  It was four days until the ‘dance-off’ and a week until the premier of Romeo and Juliet.  The ballet practices were ramping up, leaving all the dancers exhausted with barely anytime to think about the obnoxious street dancers.

Jongin was going through his final act, the death of Mercutio, in his head when the blonde protester, never far from his sight, stopping him before he goes in the studio with a call in hopes of riling him up as he did every day since the eye lock incident in the classroom.

Every

Damn

_Day._

It made Jongin go from staring to glaring as he watched the boy like a hawk from the window.  The smart thing to do would be for Jongin to ignore the call, but something in him made him stop.  It was probably the same thing that made him watch the boy again and again.

“Are any of you ever actually going to dance or just look pretty next to that ballet bar?  Hey, answer me, Fancy Feet!”

“I’ve never even _seen_ a ballet before.  That’s for like old people!  Why don’t you try and do something that loosens you up?”

“Who’s that girl with you before?  She looks like she trips over her own feet every day!   Is she really the best that you got?”

“Hey, Fancy Feet!  You and that pretty boy you are always with ready to get your asses beat?” 

The pent of anger was steaming from him and was starting to get to him.  He remembered almost screaming when telling his roommate, Sehun, about the situation, so full of frustration.  When it was just the two of them, Jongin was able to snap back replies in an instant, no holding back.  Kai would also be able to snap back without care.  Unfortunately, this was a stranger, not Sehun, and he was Jongin, not Kai.  That did not mean he couldn’t channel some Sehun or Kai.

He made a decision to try with all his might that could pretend this boy was Sehun.

The first time he had tried to talk but nothing came out of his mouth as he rushed to the doors of the studio, head hung low.

Today he didn’t.

“Pretty boy not accompanying you today?  What a shame!  I needed to ask which one of you was going to try on the tutu I got.”

_Pretend he is Sehun._

_Pretend he is Sehun._

_Close your eyes and pretend._

“Big words for someone who isn’t even that good.”  He muttered.  Okay, so that is not how he would talk to Sehun but at least he had gotten it out.  It was low and Jongin wasn’t even sure he could be heard.

The curly brown hair kid next to blond spoke up.  “Hey!  Baekhyun is amazing!”

“What? Hold on…”  The protester, sitting next to the door, stood up.  “I know you watch me from the window!  You _know_ that I’m good!”

_Pretend that it is Sehun._

_Pretend that it is Sehun._

“I can’t tear my eyes away from the train wreck you call dancing.”  The other’s eyes are aflame and adrenaline pumps through Jongin’s veins.  It was a lie, but he couldn’t hold back from some of their comments.  Some of the other dancers had stopped with their moves and turned to look at the two.

“Fuck you!”  Baekhyun, apparently that was his name, cursed.  He was now close to Jongin, face right under his.  If this was any other time, Jongin would have stopped at the handsomeness of the features before him, but this time he was angry.  “You think doing a couple moves over and over again is going to beat us.  Think again.”

The insult came a lot quicker this time.  “Maybe if you struck to one you could master it to an okay level in a couple years.”

“Brat!”  The boy hissed.  “I feel the music, I take risks!  What do you do?  Nothing!”

Nothing.  _Nothing_?  Jongin doesn’t even know how to communicate with the ignorance this boy is spewing out.  Dance is dance, no matter what form it was in.  “Ballet tells a story with music, just like yours does.”

The boy looked like he couldn’t even believe Jongin would say such a thing.  “Seriously?”

A voice yells out from the studio door.  “Kai don’t talk to these fools!  They’re not worth your attention!”

Victoria walks over and takes Jongin by the shoulder.  Baekhyun smirks as he is pulled away.  Audaciously, he puts up a hand and waves.  “Goodbye, Fancy Feet!”

He’s inside and warming up when he hears Taemin’s voice.  “Saw how close you and protest boy were.”

Jongin sighs, adrenaline used up leaving him tired.  “Baekhyun thinks Ballet is old and useless.”

“Baekhyun?  First name basis now?”  The boys laughs a bit before regaining composure as the teacher walks by.  “Have you told him about us in the good old days?”

“No.”

“Good, I think it will be best if we surprise them.  Tell them that Ballet and street dancing are just as good as the other.”

That day, five slows songs play during the warm-up period.  Baekhyun proceeds to do body rolls to each and every one of them.

\---

Later that night, he walks into his dorm and rants to his dorm mate about the fight.  Sehun is less than impressed.

“Dude, you could out dance all them.  I saw them yesterday walking back from class.  That one guy, brown curly hair, couldn’t even do windmills correctly.”  Sehun starts out with.  There’s disappointment in his voice.  He was also on the dance team back in the day but gave it up do his parents pressuring him into accounting which left no time for dance.

Jongin thinks back to the brown curly haired boy.  “He’s been practicing.”

“Not enough.  You’ll wipe the floor with them.”  The boy pauses.  “Do they know about you and Taemin?”

“Unless they looked us up, no.”

“Perfect.”  Sehun pauses.  “Is that boy Taemin says you stare at coming?”

Jongin is caught off guard before turning to the other’s bed where Sehun is sprawled out nonchalant.   “What?”

“Blonde boy, saw him too.”  The boy picks up his phone, seeming to read something.  “Baekhyun is his name, apparently?”

“He’s the jerk that calls me Fancy Feet.”  Jongin says immediately before shaking his head.  “There is no one I stare at!  Are you talking to Taemin?”

“He says you looked at him before that.”

“When have you been talking to Taemin without me?”

Sehun shrugs.  “You space out sometimes.”

“Ugh!”  Jongin exclaims.

\---

The night of the dance-off was hectic as the ballet company picked who was to be in the dance and which performances that they should do.  Five of them were chosen, Taemin and Jongin being picked to do a duet.  The audience was jammed pack with the non-approved by the institution ‘dance-off’ between the street dancing underdogs and the silver spoon ballet dancers.

Also, the department did some snooping and found all the names to the nameless familiar faces.  The main leader’s name was Hyoyeon and was graduating soon with the other girl being named ‘Amber’.  The boy in the beanie was named ‘Lay’ or ‘Yixing’ or something no one could agree on.  Brown haired boy was named ‘Jongdae’ or ‘Chen’.  All were considered great in their areas of dance.

The judges were various upperclassmen in the dance department.  Some were classical, some were street, and most were modern.  Victoria and Hyoyeon were tasked with picking impartial judges, but the special treatment towards the Ballet school were wide spread and impartial judges were a rarity, because there are none.

Jongin was aware of the resentment of the student body but was not active in the changes to be made.  Their department worked hand, long hours to achieve this position, it wasn’t as if this treatment was undeserved by the students.  Also, these kids were playing dirty, getting mad at them and not the institution.

The dance off started.  A coin toss determined that the ballet students were up first.

Jimin’s solo from last year’s Nutcracker when he was cast as a lone Marzipan was perfect while Victoria’s and Eunhyuk’s final dance at the peak of Romeo and Juliet was breathtaking.  Even the protesters were a bit impressed by the emotional story, although none were keen to admit it.

The other team bit back hard with a choreographed break dance, and they were sharp.  Jongin recognized it as one of the dances they had practiced outside the dance studio.  Was there going to be no surprises?  Then, Hyoyeon and Lay did a routine that Jongin was sure could out beat most of Taemin’s and his routines back in the day.  The result was Taemin looking a bit more nervous than he originally planned to.

The other girl didn’t hold back either.  Amber was charismatic, hyping the crowd up and seemed to be having a grand old time, enjoying herself and the dancing.  Her energy came from the crowd and Jongin was impressed.

The blonde boy, Baekhyun was next.  Jongin and Taemin’s routine would be right after that.  They stood in the wings while Baekhyun whispered to him, eyes still on Amber as she charmed the audience with her solo.  “Are you ready to lose, Fancy Feet?”

_Pretend it is Sehun_.

He barely needed the reminder.  He was starting to focus on the stage, his moves, the music.  His confidence levels were on the rise.

“No.”  Jongin answered.

“Are you sure?”  Beakhyun questioned.  “Do you think the audience isn’t already bored of the same tricks and twirls?”

“Those tricks and twirls have been working for many years.”

“At least you could have done something different every time we watched you from outside the studio.”

“We were doing warm-ups, not entertaining you.”

Baekhyun sighed, tilting his head down but moving his eyes up to meet Jongin’s.  His lashes were long.  “But, of course because you can’t take your eyes off me.”

A beat of red flashed over Jongin’s features.  The wings were dark, fortunately.  Baekhyun laughed before starting to walk towards the edge of the stage.  “You’re competition.  Of course I was looking.”

Baekhyun winked over his shoulder, hip out, and smile wide.   “Keep looking.”

The music starts and it is a combination of fast and slow parts.  The slow parts held a sexual undertone in the lyrics and a sexual overtone in the body rolls the boy on stage was producing.  Jongin couldn’t look away and Taemin’s mouth gaped open as he spoke.  “I’ve seen him, but not like this.”

Jongin is just as entranced as ever as those small narrow hips slowly roll from side to side following an arched pattern.  He’s seen all these moves before, but Baekhyun seemed to exaggerate them for this performance.  The audience eats it up and goes wild.

The ending is complete with a smirk as the man sashays off the stage towards Jongin with extreme confidence that sets him aglow.  Jongin forces himself to look away.

It’s his turn.

The lights blind him as he takes position.  Baekhyun is watching from the sidelines, Victoria giving a thumbs up, and from the audience, Sehun gives a small wave.  Taemin is in the same position about two yards away.  The music starts and they are off.

The dance is a modified version of the fight scene of the Romeo and Juliet where the Capulets and Montagues fight with Tybalt and Mercutio as their pawns.  In the end Mercutio dies silently uttering his famous lines “A plague on both your houses!  I am sped!” while Tybalt claims victory.

Kai and Taemin play off each other’s energy, rage of the battle, and the desire to win fueling their moves.  The music is thunderous during the fight and pounds through the audience’s ears.  The music rises to a peak.

And then stops.

Taemin ‘stabs’ him and Jongin falls.

The audience is quiet and still.

This is the part where Romeo is supposed to come in and defeat Tybalt.

He doesn’t and there is a small lull as the audience waits in confusion as no one moves.

The familiar thumping of the bass booms through the speakers.

This is definitely _not_ classical music.

Jongin arches his back and flawlessly jumps back up in to a standing position with Taemin, the two look at each other and smirk.

They both move forward, gathering momentum, before preforming a front flip before maneuvering into a position to execute flares, a crowd pleaser.

The audience recovers from shock and goes crazy.

He and Taemin have done this particular performance once live at finals of their last year on the dance team.  It was intricate, fast paced, and had a lot of tricks.  It was also tiring.  The crowd gives them energy, pumping them up on the adrenaline.

They are out of breath when they end, bowing like the ballet performers they are before exiting, smile plastered on their faces.  Jongin doesn’t miss the blonde’s eyes wide and loudmouth closed.  The ballet group hug them backstage.

Jongdae, face given quite the shock treatment, goes to preform unsure how to follow-up _that_.

The protesters stare, huddled together in the back.  Baekhyun joins them before speaking up from the sea of speechless faces.  It comes out as a snarl.  “What was _that_?”

“What was what?”  Kai asks back, innocently, a bit breathless after the performance.  The adrenaline was still pumping through him, his ‘alter ego’ still front and center.

“You know what!”   The boy hissed.

“Jongin and Taemin here used to be on their schools dance team back in the day.”  Victoria piped up, putting a hand on Taemin and Jongin’s shoulders.  “You won with that routine at finals, right?”

“Sure did.”  Taemin smiles.

\---

The ballet team wins. 

The protesters heavily frown as the other team cheers in the back room.  They grumble and moan and try to regroup with no real vigor behind their words.

Baekhyun, ugly with his downturned lips, waits for Fancy Feet to stop talking to the girl leader before cornering as people go to leave, the night late and dance practices early the next morning.  Jongin doesn’t seem surprised with Baekhyun’s reaction and waits with a hand on his hip and lips in a line as he waits for the boy to curse him out or something.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

The high from dancing, the high of being Kai, is over.  Jongin doesn’t have it in him to be his cocky self.  He thought everything about him was said and no further discussion was needed.  “About?”

“Doing what we do?”  Baekhyun says as if it is the most obvious thing in the world.  “I terrorized you about only being a fancy robot dancer for two weeks and you just took it like a pushover.”

Jongin the pushover, accurate state Jongin thinks.  “I thought it would be better to show you rather than talk.  I think my talents hold more value than my words.”

“I’ll say.”  Baekhyun huffs.  “You’re a shaking mess except when you dance.”

“People say I have an alter ego when I dance, Kai they call him.”  Jongin explains, adrenaline fading as Kai fades away as well.

“It doesn’t matter.”  The protester waves off.  “You won.  We need to get a protest together for the school.”  He goes to walk off, Jongin in a daring move speaks up.

“You know, Victoria has some clout with upper management.”  The news visibly perks the other boy’s ears.  “She could talk to them to see about getting you the empty studio in the tap department.”

Baekhyun stares at him, face incredulous.  “Why would you do that to us?”

“We already talked about it with our teacher when the protests started.  The dance off just made the issue more urgent for us.”

“That doesn’t explain anything.”

“It’s not our fault you don’t have a room, it’s the school.”  Jongin’s eyes wondered over the others shoulders to find most of the company gone and Sehun waiting by the exit door.  “You shouldn’t be treated like shit by the school because they had a pipe break.”

The other continued to keep him in place with the lock on his eyes, still a bit unbelieving and searching the ballet dancer’s face for lies.  When he didn’t find any, he smiled.  “Thank you.  You don’t know what that means for us.  For me.  I have work during the new class time and I can’t make it and it is passed drop day and I don’t want to fail it.”  Baekhyun ends in a ramble.

Jongin is a bit shocked by this toned down Baekhyun.  He is a lot more pleasant than the one he had been recently dealing.  Baekhyun continues to speak, a blush rising to his cheeks as he rattles on.  “I’m also sorry about those ballet comment.  I actually like ballet, I just wanted to ruffle all of you up so we could win.  Also Jongdae was giving me shit for knowing which ballet position was which.”

A smile appears on Jongin’s lips as the protester takes this time to recover from his embarrassing confession.

“I’ll see you around.”  Jongin takes his cue to leave, stepping around the other.  The other whispers.

“I hope I get to see you soon.”  There is a wink and Jongin is thoroughly confused as he leaves the other and goes to gather Sehun and leave.

On the way back Sehun sees a note sticking out from Jongin’s dance bag and Sehun asks who he has seduced this time.  Jongin smiles as he holds the paper and stares at the ten digits sprawled across it.

**Author's Note:**

> This isn’t my favorite piece of work... but I hope it was still enjoyable!  
> I know nothing about street dance and barely anything about ballet (especially pertaining to Romeo and Juliet) but I love watching both styles of dance. I hope the terminology is correct and if it is not, please tell me.  
> I don’t have a foundation in really understanding Taemin’s or Victoria’s personality (I stan SHINee’s music but only know a little about them personally, even less with Red Velvet), so if their personalities are outrageous, I apologize.  
> Traditional/Ballet Team: Eunhyuk (Super Junior), Victoria (Red Velvet), Jimin (BTS), Taemin (SHINee), Jongin/Kai (EXO)  
> Change/Street Team: Hyoyeon (SNSD), Amber (f(x)), Yixing/Lay (EXO), Jongdae/Chen (EXO), Baekhyun (EXO)


End file.
